My parents used IBM while on the road from Florida to New Hampshire in May-August 1999. They generally stopped in small towns, but only rarely had to use the 800 number access. They also found IBM to be more reliable than their regular local ISP, and would have kept IBM if there was a local node in the very small town they permanently live in.
>>Oh, and a library doesn't have the right to decide what it wants to put on its shelves? If so, can't it decide what it wants to put on its computers?
Actually, when the marginal cost of allowing disfavored content through is so low, they probably don't. And shouldn't, personally. Look at the variety of communities that have to give parade permits to groups they would just as soon deny oxygen to.
Sure, if the volume starts to be problem, and use of the bandwidth for more common library activities, such as research, gets affected, then limit it. Like if there were more hours per year spent on KKK marches down Main Street then actual vehicle traffic, then something's out of whack.
Not so much the premises, but the implementations. Most librarians will work their local community to accomodate reasonable requests. Sure, there are exceptions to either side, but at least you can deal with a local human about your problems.
But the implementations to date have mostly been acquisitions of blocking software that is tightly sealed and not readily amenable to immediate adjustment.
This whole area will be going through rapid evolution, and I'd like to see most communities choosing to have at least some totally unrestricted access facilities. But for the restricted facilities, the implementation of the restrictions needs vast improvement.
The real test of commitment to free speech is when the majority viewpoint finds a particular minority to be odious, and either permits or blocks their viewpoint.
In addition to writing your legislators, on paper, with good spelling and polite language, I would recommend talking to your purchasing department.
If you've ever been asked which product to buy, or participated in an RFP, those are huge opportunities to influence the process. Calmly explain to purchasing all the bad things in UCITA. Try to get a standard clause in all your purchase contracts to get all vendors dealing with your company to waive UCITA.
If you're dealing with vendor marketing, tell them you don't like UCITA, and products that don't come encumbered with it's trappings will rate higher in your evaluations.
When dealing with your peers, enlighten them on UCITA, and get the word to spread.
I've had the most success with paper letters. And I've been writing to my legislators, off and on, for years. Sometimes I'll get a response to e-mail, but classic paper mail really fits the culture well.
Did you know that quite a few legislatures require men to wear a coat and tie while the body is in session?
A paper letter, spell-checked, with proper structure, fits well into that kind of culture.
I don't know if anybody reads day-old SlashDot threads, but today's Washington Post has an article about Congressman Frank Wolf trying to get this reversed.
Don't know if he reads SlashDot, maybe it was the Rush Limbaugh crowd that made him jump so fast, but it certainly is quick response.
Many large corporations are so inefficient that they can't pay their bills in a timely fashion. This hurts their suppliers unfairly, who quite logically will resort to automatic, pre-programmed service cancellations. I've seen it numerous times, and from the outside this certainly looks like another case.
I'm a parent of five and a six year-old, and I really strive for the moments when they forget Nintendo and Pokemon and "think differently".
I'm proud they're not sheeple, and continue to encourage them to stretch their brains in ways that mass-commercialism doesn't.
Some years from now, if they want children of their own, they could have my opinion for the asking that using human genome knowledge to select for "different thinking" children would be a good thing.
Curious, I left Northern Virginia in November 1997 to take a job in Orlando. So if the Washington you headed to in January was DC, I've got my own list of differences to note.
I moved into Winter Springs, rather north of Disney World, and a convenient drive to the Sanford Flea Market. We had cable modem service hooked up in July, and fairly soon will have DSL in the neighborhood for competition. Over 30% of Orlando is covered by either DSL or Cable Modem now.
The Sanford Flea market is a cool place to shop, be it for cell phones, pecans, or DIMMs. Not necessarily the best prices, but lots of local color.
The technology in the theme parks is inconsistent, and I think the heirs to Walt's vision aren't doing as good a job in DisneyWorld as Universal Studios is with Islands of Adventure, or SeaWorld.
As for bad phone lines, the Maryland suburbs have some truly outdated switches that are slowly approaching their 30 year writedown, and have equally great difficulty with 14.4 connections.
I'll agree with the poster who commented about the water, it's some of the worst I've tasted in fifteen countries.
But as for Orlando being a huge technical dichotomy, it seems rather better off than the average US city. Compare Potomac, Maryland to SouthEast DC. Then Winter Park to Parramore. Probably the same technical gap, but the ratio of tech-haves to tech-havenots seems lower in Orlando than around DC.
For all that, though, I'd trade my cable modem for five decent restaraunts. All the food down here is way too bland. I'm not sure if it's due to the parks constant promotion of their "themed entertainment experiences" rolling over into bland food (and bland t-shirts), but I've found that the only really good food here is stuff I cook myself.
In some period of time there will be a whole generation of politicians that will have to relearn some present day techniques.
On military service during the various wars, candidates always find some way to explain their actions as honorable. Clinton, Quayle, Bush, ad nauseum all have wriggled like worms. So will politicians with socially unpopular words resurfacing from their past lives.
On nominating Justices, politicians have searched for candidates with a very small paper trail, ever since the Bork hearings. As a compromise, they accept a paper trail that runs through a fairly wide middle of the road. Fall outside that with your Internet posting history, and you won't get nominated either.
On 60's drug use, some claim not to have inhaled, others plead youthful inexperience. Some ask for a statute of limitations. These too will be repeated with Internet words typed in haste.
It's just another case where something happening on the Internet first comes across as new and never before seen, but really everything old is new again.
Or, "History repeats itself, but each time the price goes up" -unknown author
I did the independent thing for a year, my wife checked the health plans up and down for the four-person company we started. Blue Cross coverage plans, quality of service, and financial soundness vary quite a bit between the various US states. In Florida the application process is tedious, most any carrier will be very agressive about cancelling coverage if the monthly check is ever even slightly late, and if you're not coming in with a big group, send the mail registered!
Too many stories from other small business owners about the insurance carriers just ignoring those potential customers they don't want to deal with.
Next time around we'll look much closer at going in with some group coverage like IEEE.
I think in a few ways this is analogous to what happens to local stores when WalMart comes to town. Vendors offering mediocre value get crushed on price, and go out of business.
Microsoft looks like they will try yet again to offer middle of the road quality for a price that undercuts existing competitors.
However, their logic is a bit flawed. The article stated that this Internet venture was funded to protect the core software cash flow. This could be rationalized in a few ways.
By showing customers how much great, free, Internet access they get when they buy a PC with Windows on it.
By offering custom content that is available only over the free connection.
By giving price discounts on purchases made while connected over the free connection.
Not saying that all or any of these will work, but they're worth talking about. As far as the custom content goes, hasn't Microsoft already tried that and failed? (Slate - now free?).
Price discounting can't go too deep, otherwise it also becomes a subsidized activity, and the whole thing collapses back on strategy one, using the free connection to drive Windows sales.
That can draw in quite a few people, but many people still pay for premium TV channels when broadcast is available. Somewhat of a mixed analogy, being a comparison of service to content, but if you equate using Windows to annoying TV commercials then the point is in there.
Stated differently, people that want a good steak won't stop wanting a good steak just because there are free, overcooked, greaseburgers just waiting to be picked up out of the warming tray.
Any ISP, AOL or tiny, that serves up real value can survive this.
Slashdot Mirror
My parents used IBM while on the road from Florida to New Hampshire in May-August 1999. They generally stopped in small towns, but only rarely had to use the 800 number access. They also found IBM to be more reliable than their regular local ISP, and would have kept IBM if there was a local node in the very small town they permanently live in.
>>Oh, and a library doesn't have the right to decide what it wants to put on its shelves? If so, can't it decide what it wants to put on its computers?
Actually, when the marginal cost of allowing disfavored content through is so low, they probably don't. And shouldn't, personally. Look at the variety of communities that have to give parade permits to groups they would just as soon deny oxygen to.
Sure, if the volume starts to be problem, and use of the bandwidth for more common library activities, such as research, gets affected, then limit it. Like if there were more hours per year spent on KKK marches down Main Street then actual vehicle traffic, then something's out of whack.
Not so much the premises, but the implementations. Most librarians will work their local community to accomodate reasonable requests. Sure, there are exceptions to either side, but at least you can deal with a local human about your problems.
But the implementations to date have mostly been acquisitions of blocking software that is tightly sealed and not readily amenable to immediate adjustment.
This whole area will be going through rapid evolution, and I'd like to see most communities choosing to have at least some totally unrestricted access facilities. But for the restricted facilities, the implementation of the restrictions needs vast improvement.
The real test of commitment to free speech is when the majority viewpoint finds a particular minority to be odious, and either permits or blocks their viewpoint.
I think you fail the test.
In addition to writing your legislators, on paper, with good spelling and polite language, I would recommend talking to your purchasing department.
If you've ever been asked which product to buy, or participated in an RFP, those are huge opportunities to influence the process. Calmly explain to purchasing all the bad things in UCITA. Try to get a standard clause in all your purchase contracts to get all vendors dealing with your company to waive UCITA.
If you're dealing with vendor marketing, tell them you don't like UCITA, and products that don't come encumbered with it's trappings will rate higher in your evaluations.
When dealing with your peers, enlighten them on UCITA, and get the word to spread.
I've had the most success with paper letters. And I've been writing to my legislators, off and on, for years. Sometimes I'll get a response to e-mail, but classic paper mail really fits the culture well.
Did you know that quite a few legislatures require men to wear a coat and tie while the body is in session?
A paper letter, spell-checked, with proper structure, fits well into that kind of culture.
I don't know if anybody reads day-old SlashDot threads, but today's Washington Post has an article about Congressman Frank Wolf trying to get this reversed.
Don't know if he reads SlashDot, maybe it was the Rush Limbaugh crowd that made him jump so fast, but it certainly is quick response.
Many large corporations are so inefficient that they can't pay their bills in a timely fashion. This hurts their suppliers unfairly, who quite logically will resort to automatic, pre-programmed service cancellations. I've seen it numerous times, and from the outside this certainly looks like another case.
I'm a parent of five and a six year-old, and I really strive for the moments when they forget Nintendo and Pokemon and "think differently".
I'm proud they're not sheeple, and continue to encourage them to stretch their brains in ways that mass-commercialism doesn't.
Some years from now, if they want children of their own, they could have my opinion for the asking that using human genome knowledge to select for "different thinking" children would be a good thing.
Curious, I left Northern Virginia in November 1997 to take a job in Orlando. So if the Washington you headed to in January was DC, I've got my own list of differences to note.
I moved into Winter Springs, rather north of Disney World, and a convenient drive to the Sanford Flea Market. We had cable modem service hooked up in July, and fairly soon will have DSL in the neighborhood for competition. Over 30% of Orlando is covered by either DSL or Cable Modem now.
The Sanford Flea market is a cool place to shop, be it for cell phones, pecans, or DIMMs. Not necessarily the best prices, but lots of local color.
The technology in the theme parks is inconsistent, and I think the heirs to Walt's vision aren't doing as good a job in DisneyWorld as Universal Studios is with Islands of Adventure, or SeaWorld.
As for bad phone lines, the Maryland suburbs have some truly outdated switches that are slowly approaching their 30 year writedown, and have equally great difficulty with 14.4 connections.
I'll agree with the poster who commented about the water, it's some of the worst I've tasted in fifteen countries.
But as for Orlando being a huge technical dichotomy, it seems rather better off than the average US city. Compare Potomac, Maryland to SouthEast DC. Then Winter Park to Parramore. Probably the same technical gap, but the ratio of tech-haves to tech-havenots seems lower in Orlando than around DC.
For all that, though, I'd trade my cable modem for five decent restaraunts. All the food down here is way too bland. I'm not sure if it's due to the parks constant promotion of their "themed entertainment experiences" rolling over into bland food (and bland t-shirts), but I've found that the only really good food here is stuff I cook myself.
In some period of time there will be a whole generation of politicians that will have to relearn some present day techniques.
On military service during the various wars, candidates always find some way to explain their actions as honorable. Clinton, Quayle, Bush, ad nauseum all have wriggled like worms. So will politicians with socially unpopular words resurfacing from their past lives.
On nominating Justices, politicians have searched for candidates with a very small paper trail, ever since the Bork hearings. As a compromise, they accept a paper trail that runs through a fairly wide middle of the road. Fall outside that with your Internet posting history, and you won't get nominated either.
On 60's drug use, some claim not to have inhaled, others plead youthful inexperience. Some ask for a statute of limitations. These too will be repeated with Internet words typed in haste.
It's just another case where something happening on the Internet first comes across as new and never before seen, but really everything old is new again.
Or, "History repeats itself, but each time the price goes up" -unknown author
I did the independent thing for a year, my wife checked the health plans up and down for the four-person company we started. Blue Cross coverage plans, quality of service, and financial soundness vary quite a bit between the various US states. In Florida the application process is tedious, most any carrier will be very agressive about cancelling coverage if the monthly check is ever even slightly late, and if you're not coming in with a big group, send the mail registered!
Too many stories from other small business owners about the insurance carriers just ignoring those potential customers they don't want to deal with.
Next time around we'll look much closer at going in with some group coverage like IEEE.
Microsoft looks like they will try yet again to offer middle of the road quality for a price that undercuts existing competitors.
However, their logic is a bit flawed. The article stated that this Internet venture was funded to protect the core software cash flow. This could be rationalized in a few ways.
Not saying that all or any of these will work, but they're worth talking about. As far as the custom content goes, hasn't Microsoft already tried that and failed? (Slate - now free?).
Price discounting can't go too deep, otherwise it also becomes a subsidized activity, and the whole thing collapses back on strategy one, using the free connection to drive Windows sales.
That can draw in quite a few people, but many people still pay for premium TV channels when broadcast is available. Somewhat of a mixed analogy, being a comparison of service to content, but if you equate using Windows to annoying TV commercials then the point is in there.
Stated differently, people that want a good steak won't stop wanting a good steak just because there are free, overcooked, greaseburgers just waiting to be picked up out of the warming tray.
Any ISP, AOL or tiny, that serves up real value can survive this.
Could you send me an e-mail at my work address? I started at CA recently; I'll try to find out for you.
Jeff